Al Jazeera: the new voice in Turkey

Social media campaign paves the way for the launch of the Turkish-language digital news outlet.

Al Jazeera is launching its Turkish language service, bringing the network’s unparallelled output to a unique and sophisticated market straddling Asia and Europe.

The launch of aljazeera.com.tr on Wednesday will give Turkish-speakers daily news, opinion, sports, a digital magazine and documentaries. The website portal will be complemented by mobile apps and a digital magazine in Turkish.

Ismail Kizilbay, the managing director of Al Jazeera Turk, said he was extremely excited by the launch.

“My team has been working hard to ensure that we meet the highest journalistic standards of the Al Jazeera network and we believe that our digital launch will contribute significantly to the Turkish language market. 

“Most importantly, our digital offerings including website, mobile apps and digital magazine can be accessed anywhere and at any time. We are proud to have joined the Al Jazeera Network family and we will strive to ensure objective and factual reporting from, and for, one of the most important geopolitical markets,” said Kizilbay.

Although it is based in Turkey, the site is aimed at Turkish-speakers throughout the world, with a significant pre-launch social media engagement in Azerbaijan, Germany, the US, Bosnia, UK, Cyprus and Netherlands.

Al Jazeera Turk’s news director, Gurkan Zengin, said that the site’s multilingual staff would deliver news to nearly 140 million Turkish-speakers.

This is the first ever digital-only launch in the history of the network, with a first newsroom focusing on both TV-style production as well as other digital content.

Al Jazeera Turk’s news director, Gürkan Zengin, said staff would enjoy complete editorial independence.

“Accurate and objective news, equal treatment to different opinions, and always being on people’s side will be the basic pillars of our reporting,” he said.

Source: Al Jazeera